Author
Topic: 81 Invader tear down (Read 49 times)

Sunday afternoon was beautiful, sunny, calm and right about freezing. So I used the time to start stripping down the 81 Invader to see just how good, or bad it really is. There were some encouraging items like the cooling system being full of nice green anti-freeze and seeing that the bushing on one of the ski spindles was actually free (don't see this very often at all), and this is the first set of 81 skis that I have seen that have not been fully rusted through.

But I am also seeing a couple of oddities and am interested if others can add clarity. Here are my questions:

1. The 80 LTD & 81 LTD and this sled have the vari-ride suspension. The 80 LTD and the 81 LTD have clips on the track that would prevent side motion of the track, but this sled does not. Any ideas?

2. The 80 LTD & 81 LTD have tubular stays to brace the front attachment point for the belly pan. This sled has the older rectangular style belly pay stay.

3. The LTDs do not have multiple suspension mounting holes for the rear suspension. This sled has two mounting holes on each side of the rear tunnel, almost as if the tunnel was stamped for the older suspension and then they decided to insert the vari-ride with the longer suspension mounting length. Anyone know anything about this?

I have not opened up the engine yet, so still don't know if there is any hope for that powerplant or not.

I have noticed some of these things on my 81 as well. It looks to me like they took the leftover 78-80 chassis (or maybe just the tooling to make them?) and retrofitted the Vari-Ride rear skids which is why there are multiple mounting holes. But if I remember correctly on my 81, the hole is in the steel bracket and does not go all the way through the aluminum tunnel.

I'm not quite sure why they changed the bulkheads from rectangular to tubular. My guess would be for ease of manufacturing. Other than this difference the 80' 4/6 should be the same as then Invaders.

81s were remaned 80s that were left over... I have 4or 5 81 sleds or chassis, all have the blue tunnel decals under the 81 style….that's why the rear mounting brackets are different, and the pan supports, the round ones don't break quite as easy